Willamette bridge design gets lukewarm reception

Architect Donald MacDonald has some fancy ideas for the newest bridge to cross the Willamette River in 35 years. Think slender. Think delicate. Think flowing waterfalls and curving bike paths.
Or maybe not.

At a Friday design forum for the Willamette River Bridge, which will take the planned Portland-Milwaukie light-rail across the river, local architects suggested MacDonald go back to the drawing board and try a simpler approach.

“My main point here is, less is more,” said local architect Rick Potestio after MacDonald’s presentation. “The basics here are great, but they could be diminished by elaborations. At the end of the day, it’s a bridge.”

But simply creating a bridge isn’t what MacDonald had in mind. He sees the structure he’s designing as a public space that he thinks should reflect Portland’s identity.

“I’m looking at the bridge as a platform for public use,” said MacDonald. “We want to link this bridge into the community.”

A past bridge design of MacDonald’s in Dubai incorporated the image of a falcon, a native resident of the Arabian desert, into the bridge’s legs. For a bridge he designed near Sixth Avenue in downtown Los Angeles, he included six towers made to resemble Los Angeles’s numerous downtown skyscrapers.

For Portland, MacDonald wants to integrate the image of nearby waterfalls, such as Multnomah Falls, by placing water pipes on the bridge and allowing the water to cascade off the side. MacDonald also mentioned locating a public amphitheater beneath the bridge, as well as placing sculptural solar panel installations on the bridge to highlight Portland’s commitment to sustainability.

“People here have a real concern for their environment that you don’t see everywhere else,” MacDonald said.

But architect Cassidy Bolger with Holst Architecture is worried that flashy additions will overwhelm what he thinks should be a simple and elegant design.

“I am concerned about all of the different parameters that have to be met with things like waterfalls and solar panels,” Bolger said. “Are the goals of lightness and slenderness being met?”

MacDonald’s idea for a belvedere, a viewpoint that would be located in the center of the bridge, and his indicated width for bike lanes were also points of concern.

“People will not stop in the middle of a bridge,” Potestio said. “We have a very elaborate waterfront and there are plenty of amenities in place. You need to understand how much cycling has become a major form of transportation in our inner city. If you have too narrow of a bikeway, it won’t work.”

Not everyone was ready to veto MacDonald’s version of a Portland bridge, however. At least on person attending the forum spoke up in favor of being able to find a spot in the middle of a bridge to safely stop and enjoy the view.

MacDonald still has time to convince Portland’s architecture community that his design ideas are feasible; the project design will only be 15 percent complete by Aug.15, and a final design will not be ready until the middle of next year.

“We’re at the point now where we’re synthesizing all of our information,” TriMet architect Bob Hastings said. “In August we’ll be able to bring a cost analysis to the project’s citizen advisory committee.”

I was wondering if any images of the proposed bridge Mr. MacDonald is suggesting are available. As a bridge designer I am a little dismayed about Architects adding gingerbread (non-structural elements) to bridges. I believe the first step should be to identify the approximate width, length, lanes (both bike and rail) and structure type before going onto what color, waterfalls, etc.

A cable stay bridge will have different abilities compared to a plate girder.

When you see the Golden Gate bridge, you see the bridge first and gingerbread later (if ever). Name the best bridges in the world and it is the structure that makes the impact not the “extras”. Reading this article I would ask “before selling me the seat covers, show me what the car looks like”.

I am all for aesthetics ( I actually like the idea of using space under the bridge) but the bridge is the main element dominating the look of the project and it is the element that should come first.